Here and Now
The Shearers and the Shorn: A Study of Life in a Devon Community. By E. W. Martin. (Routledge and Kegan Paul, 40s.) The Sociology of Housing : Studies at Berins- field. By R. N. Morris and John Mogey. (Routledge and Kegan Paul, 42s.) An Introduction to the Study of Social Adminis- tration. Edited by David C. Marsh and others. (Routledge and Kegan Paul, 25s.) As I want to use Professor Gould's Penguin anthology as a kind of touchstone in my con- sideration of the hardback volumes, and as I think it deserves commendation, let me first say what it is not. It is in no way a survey, it does not cover the social sciences—really only sociology and social anthropology—and three of the papers have appeared elsewhere. It represents an enterprise which I hope will be rewarded and which ought regularly to be repeated. Above all, it is, in two senses, extremely professional and at the same time accessible, as a Penguin should be, to the lay reader.
Its first professionalism is based on com- petence and being thoroughly contemporary: this is how sociologists think and operate, now. In consequence, the papers by Professor Selvin on 'Training for Social Research' (which every British university and college, contemplating ' having sociology as a subject, should study) and by Drs. Martin and Fox' are tough. They are,
however, not obscure and their toughness is part of their subject-matter and not the result of jargon or bombast. But more important is that, though Professor Gould has found it necessary to preface these essays with a 'defence of sociology,' this is the sort of book that itself proves that sociology is a reality in that there is a common universe of fruitful discourse and investigation going on within a profession.
What is this profession about? Dr. Mann, in his An Approach to Urban Sociology, tells us
that those who want to 'build Jerusalem in England's green and pleasant land . . . will . . . do so with very little insight gained from British sociology.' This is indeed true. But though sociology may not always be useful in its methods or its results to town planners, poli- ticians, educationalists, social workers, and so on, its task is not to be so useful: it is a task of analysis and understanding social structure. This is educative, interesting in itself, and broadens human sympathy in our dour age. It has not much to do with remaking the world, nor with realising social and political passions. Unfortu- nately, it is for this materialisation of ideology that most people turn to what they believe is sociology, and get cross when it returns a dusty answer. And, alas, the belief that sociology is this kind of magic makes people who have-plenty of sensible things to say about social life call their excellent descriptive activities sociology. Mr. Martin's interesting study in Devon falls into this error rather often.
What Mr. E. W. Martin gives us is an analysis of life in the small Devon town of Okehampton in its transition, only half over, from a 'cere monial regime' of squires to the twentieth cen- tury. He uses bits of sociology to explain (a little) and adorn (rather a lot) what he is saying. He is a good social historian and is strong on religion, particularly the Bible Christians. I en- joyed his book very much and felt profoundly glad never to have lived in Okehampton. But then, as a rootless Scot I tend to feel this about English country life. Perhaps Mr. Martin feels differently.
Professors Morris and Mogey are very techni- cal, clear, painstaking and thorough in their study of what happens when the inhabitants of an Oxfordshire shanty-town are moved -into a planned, respectable, drab but OK village. Berinsfield provides a neat occasion to control the human variable and study what rehousing does to a community as a system of relationships. Everything is very careful, tentative and method- ologically rigorous, but not much seems to have taken place socially—though the physical im- provement is manifest. The suggestions for housing policy are unexceptionable. The book will be really useful to other researchers. But for all its merits and despite its misleading title, one is left very conscious of the fact that sophistica- tion in social research is by no means the same as sophistication in sociology.
By comparison, the Penguin takes us to a realm of profitable sophistication, and questions which it is worth attempting to answer—how do we learn the language of our class and group and what does this do to us? Is the truism that we are being secularised true? 'How does the family really work—and what must we know to find out? What can we know about to- morrow? How do we educate people for modern sociology? How does change take place in 'little societies'? Bernstein, Martin, Fox, Bell, Mair, Selvin and the rest are not concerned to convince, but to know or assess the limits
of our ways to knowledge. The result is as dn. cult 'as good popularisation in natural science,
but more rewarding. - Professor Marsh and his colleagues are not concerned with the student of sociology, but with students and aspiring students who want to en- gage in social work of one 'sort or another— believing that this is sociology. As a guide this should be a very helpful book to sixth formers as well as to older people thinking of taking short courses of training. It does not generalise and there are rather a lot of biblio-
graphical slips, but 'does exactly what it sets out to do :without pretension' and should prove useful for just this reason. It is less successful, however, in another necessary task: the guidance of the educated layman through the jungles of the welfare state. Much more would have to be said of actual finance and day-to-day administration and authority to complete the picture, and it seems a pity that this has not been done. The book has. no intention of commenting on or im- proving the fundamentals of our social welfare— for that sort of thing the reader should turn to the recent excellent little book on Social Policy by Professor T. H. Marshall.
DONALD 0. MaCRAE
Previous page
